"We plan to increase gas supplies from Europe, as we did all through the previous year. We are working in this direction, he told Ukraine’s Channel 5.

Ukraine "has a chance to attain real diversification of natural gas supplies," he said, adding that reverse supplies of gas would forestall "Russia’s blackmail concerning possible refusal to supply gas." "It might be a blackmail of not only Ukraine but the entire Europe. We will be able to forestall this by diversifying gas purchases," he said.

Earlier, Ukraine’s PrimeMInister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said that is Ukraine kept the current pace of diversification of gas supplies sources it might soon do without Russian gas at all. He said that in 2013 Ukraine had bought five percent of its gas from the European Union, with the rest 95% being bought from Russia. In January 2014, in his words, Ukraine bought already 67% from Europe and 33% - from Russia.